Oxford before Laptops, Cellphones, and Internet
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How Did We Do This Before Cellphones?
This question requires a complicated answer because the cellphone does many things that used to require separate devices (phones, cameras, stereos, radios, maps, flashlights (i.e., torches), calendars) and handwritten messages and letters.
Let’s start with my room in stairwell 4 of DeBreyne quad (built in 1972). “My room is modern and very large. It has a [single] bed, desk, reading chair, coffee table, two [narrow, window bench] sofas, and about ten bookshelves. There is also a small sink and three closets.” The showers, toilets, and kitchen were shared with three other people. “Normally, I make my own breakfast in the kitchen, usually coffee and Scottish oats. Then I have a bowl of soup at lunch (costs about 30 pence or 45 cents); with a regular dinner. It took me two trips to the shops because I had to carry all my food. ” The windows facing the road were narrow slits like you see in castles, but the wall facing the interior garden was entirely glass. My room had no TV, no device for playing music, and no phone. There was no noise from the surrounding rooms. My room was as silent as the library.
Messages
For me, the primary mode of communication in 1986 was letters and handwritten messages. These both arrived in the Lodge where every student had a pigeonhole. The equivalent of checking your phone today was to check your pigeonhole. I did this every time I passed the Lodge and after each meal. The pigeonholes were open, so anyone could drop a message in them (anonymously) or leave small gifts or books. The romantic possibilities were a definite advantage over cellphones. As for privacy, let’s just say it was an honor system.
Phones
It was expensive to make phone calls (especially international ones), so I seldom used the telephone. There was a pay phone at the bottom of stairwell 4. People could call the payphone and occasionally someone would pick up the phone and knock on your door if it was for you. The best pay phone in Keble was located in the passageway between Pusey and De Breyne quads because it was the most private. The red phonebox located next to the Bodleian Library is where my romance-related calls took place. Even now, my heart awakes and I smile when I go by it.
Photos
Photos were precious items and to illustrate that I must tell you a story about Matriculation. This is a required ceremony and the first official thing that students do after arriving at Oxford.
“Another major thing that happened is that I matriculated. This elaborate ceremony took place on Saturday, October 18 [1986]. Everyone who was new had to dress in “subfusc” [black trousers or skirt, white shirt, white or black tie, academic gown, and mortar board] and assemble in the courtyard at 11:00 a.m. Then we marched in two’s down Park Street to the Sheldonian Theatre. This was about three blocks from Keble, but since there were at least 200 people from Keble that were new, we were stretched out about a block. When we arrived at the Sheldonian, other new students were converging in similar lines from every college in Oxford. The Keble group was the second largest (I am told that Christ Church had the most). Once seated in the Sheldonian, the head of Oxford University waved a scepter over our heads and pronounced something in Latin. This action made us official members of the university. Then there were speeches about Oxford’s age and traditions, its position as a bastion of the privileged, followed by exhortations to take advantage of its phenomenal resources. After matriculation, we returned to college to hear a speech in the Pusey Lecture Hall by the Chaplain Geoffrey Rowell on the history of Keble College and the life of its founder John Keble. At 1:30, we all assembled in the yard in our gowns for a group photo. I ordered a copy (despite the £7.95) because it is probably the only photograph that I will have of a lot of the people I have met. So now you know the other item which means a great deal to me.” [No, you did not miss something—I have not told you about the first item that meant a lot to me. I am saving that for another newletter.]
“Meryl took some snapshots of me at Matriculation, but they were at the start of a 32-photo roll, and she doesn’t expect to finish the roll until January.” I did not own a camera because it was expensive to get film developed. Meryl was only going to take thirty-two pictures over a three-month period. Before cellphones, you chose your shots very carefully and often did not get to see how they turned out for months.
The Transition from Typewriters to Computers
In 1986, I took a typewriter with me to Oxford because the university required theses to be typed. Typing could be a challenge for some students, as illustrated by Richard Bevington’s October 4, 1987, letter to me: “I finished the MA dissertation on time. I had a bit of trouble getting a machine to type the last few pages but I am sure that John McMillan or Rod Smith will be able to fill you in on the details. Joyce’s Circe chapter took nine typists; my MA dissertation on Joyce took five typewriters and three typists to eventually finish it.” Rod and John claimed that at some point no one would let Richard touch their typewriters for fear that he would destroy them. So he ended up dictating part of it to Stephen Brindle who typed it for him. Richard goes on to write: “I took the liberty of dedicating the thing to you. I hope you don’t mind. But you were the only person at Oxford to give me any help or encouragement with it. I felt you deserved some acknowledgement. I have enclosed a facsimile of my preface, which also shows my acknowledgement to my typists, for your inspection. I should imagine that there’s probably a book going around Hatfield Polytechnic right now about the identity of the Dark Lady of the Joyce dissertation.” Actually, what he said in his preface was “To Lynn Childress, the true Penelope.” That’s quite funny because, of course, in Joyce’s Ulysses it’s the false, unfaithful Penelope, Molly Bloom. I include this to show that you don’t have to be elderly to be a mentor.
However, by 1987, Keble had created a computer room in the basement of the Warden’s Lodge. There were just two computers (more like word processors). The system consisted of a monitor, processor, keyboard, mouse, and printer. The processor had two 5.25-inch slots; the software was inserted in one and the disk with your files went into the other.
On a cassette audiotape (in lieu of a letter) that I sent to my soon-to-be husband, Kent Gulley, in October 1987, I said: “Toby Lennox said that someone loaded the Amstrad computer, the brand new one, wrong, so it’s completely messed up and unusable. Not surprising, no one knows what they are doing with these computers. Presumably, it will be operational in two or three weeks. Toby said they have ordered a copy of the WordPerfect program for the college, so I think what I am going to do is sign up for the WordPerfect training courses that are offered at the computer center. I hope, presumably, that I can work interchangeably so that I can put stuff on disk using the WordPerfect program here in Oxford and be able to use those on the Leading Edge at home. Then all I have to do is transport the disks back and forth. I can carry my research on disk with me rather than carrying papers on the plane, which is what I have been doing so far.”
By January 1988, I was keying in my husband’s typed dissertation because his supervisor demanded that he have a word-processed version that could be easily revised and updated. When we returned to Oxford in the spring, we set up a side-hustle doing word processing. The demand was there—it was going to take years to convert the vast amount of typewritten material into electronic files. Considering that the entire content of the Internet has been created since 1989, it is the greatest collective building project of our time.
What do you remember about the time before laptops, cellphones, and Internet?
I would love to hear some stories in the comments. What was your first experience with computers, cellphones, and the Internet? How did it feel to live in a world without them? What has been lost by adopting the new technology? Did your parents try to restrict your access to the new technology or were they clueless about what you were doing?
In April 2007, I spent a week at St. Catherine's College for a work event. I stayed in a dorm room similar to the one you described. I woke one morning to a surprise spring snow shower. My favorite memory is wandering through Holywell Cemetery early that day. The bushes had pink blooms, and the mid-19th century headstones were draped with snow. It was magical.